Mudslide Forces Residents From their Homes in Colorado

DENVER, CO -- Clean up continues two days after dozens of people were forced out of their homes after a large mudslide hit central Colorado.

The Chaffee County Fire Chief had hoped to have residents back to their homes by Sunday afternoon but the damage is going to take some time to clean up.

Fire Chief Jim Wingert says there is "a lot of landscape damage, some structure damage - just massive amounts of rock just moved and relocated throughout Alpine."

Many of the 70 some residents who spent the night at an area high school are unable to return because of the hazards that still exist in the area.

Saturday night, starting at about seven o-clock, isolated rain storms fell hard and fast for about an hour.

When it was all over, the town of Alpine had received four to five inches of rain and a mudslide.

Wingert said the mudslide has created various hazards such as propane tanks near trees close to falling down.

He added these hazards pose too much of a safety risk for the residents of this town to return home.

Over 100 people were displaced from over 30 homes.

At least 25 of those people were just visiting Chaffee County from around the country.

Many of them remain at the Buena Vista High School as the clean up efforts continue.

The river of mud and debris destroyed at least 15 homes in its path, knocked a garage off its foundation and buried several cars.

Wingert, who said he has been doing this for 30 years, has never seen anything like this.

"What I saw this morning shocked me," he added.

The residents of Alpine are pulling together after this natural disaster to bring the mountain community out of the mountain of mud.

Wingert says it is going to take a while to get Alpine back to where it was.

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